I'm not all that familiar with what grows well in Houston, but am bumping this back up where it will be seen and get some suggestions.

Oh, yeah--I would guess you might have "black gumbo" clay soil in that area, though maybe some improved loamy soil was brought in. The gumbo hardens like brick in drought, becomes a sticky mess during rainy seasons & is somewhat alkaline. But it's a good soil when amended constantly with organic material--& you'll have plenty of that--grass clippings, oak leaves, those ginger stalks you cut every spring...

Gypsum helps wonderfully to soften that sort of clay, make the texture fluffier, especially when you're digging new holes. It's slightly acidic, too, which is beneficial.

Keeping drip hoses around your entire home foundation will help protect both your beds & the foundation of the house--that type of clay, drying & expanding in cycles, is famous for ruining home foundations--you'll want to keep it constantly slightly moist with drip hoses & mulch.

You can plant in the spring, but for hardy plants, fall is popular because you generally have more heat stress than winter kill. It helps them to get a good start in the cool rainy fall before they have to deal with summer. Mulch, mulch mulch! It's so helpful & you can pick up bags of clippings people put out on the curb.

Try to meet up with some gardeners--& the Houston area is full of garden-crazy people :-D They'll be able to give advice & share plants, too--almost everyone grows at least some of these things & they'll have plenty to give every year. Good luck & have fun!

bottle bush is good, abelia, turks cap, firebush, crepe myrtle (i'm thinkning dwarf) plumbago, lily of the nile, roses, herbs are my favorites fall is my favorite time to plant....and play in the yard...

If you are completely new to gardening why not start SLOW and by that I mean give your present landscape 1 year (all 4 seasons) and observe what blooms/when. What you can do now is prune a little if stuff looks overgrown but give the plantings some time to show you what they can do for you.

being a novice gardener, Just b/c you rip out and replace doesn't guarantee that you will have a better landscape. However, nurseries will love you for spending $ when it hadn't been established that you need to do so. I live in Richmond S if Sugar Land.

if you are comfortable doing so you could post a pic for us to evaluate what looks like a must go, keep or wait and see.

Gardens are not like house interiors where you can slap new paint, add accessories and presto! Your own. First lesson to learn is that gardens own you, not the other way around, so sit and watch Mother Nature do her thing b4 you invest time & $ changing stuff that may not need changing (or not entirely)

Thanks for all the suggestions! I'll try to add a photo soon.

We had some boxwood lining the front of the house, but they were overgrown and when we tried to prune them to where we wanted, killed a few. Oops. So we had those torn out, and now it's pretty bare.

My hope was to start preparing the beds this fall, and add in a few shrubs as soon as possible. Then maybe add some more smaller things gradually over the next year.

Well two things. 1) instead of starting at the nursery you can start by driving around your neighborhood and see what you like that is growing well. take some pictures people here can help you identify them. 2) do this test to identify your soil texture http://preparednessmama.com/jar-soil-test/

Here is what's so tricky: When I first heard the advice to look around at what neighbors grew, my initial reaction was to say to myself: "I don't WANT my yard to look like my neighbors', I want my personality reflected in it. But remember, it is not a living room. This exercise is to teach you what grows with not much care or easily. Time, experience and sweat equity will teach us some design skills that will enable us to give the landscape a look slightly diff from neighbor's using same plants. Plus, not everybody allocates the same resources caring for yard. That that alone differentiates one yard from the next.

Fair enough, but looking around the area to see what grows well and is popular doesn't mean you have to duplicate it. it tells you a lot about what kind of climate you are in, what types of things will flourish, and by exclusion which are prone to fail. It will also say something about your taste. If you come back with pictures of showy perennials, then people will know that's the kind of garden you want and can help. If you come back with pictures of uncommon items, or show a tendency towards tropical sub tropical items then that helps too. Remember common things are common for a reason they are easy

I wasn't disagreeing with your advice, it is very good advice. But remembering when I was a novice, I misunderstood the advice to mean "don't have any imagination, look around, copy your neighbors and be done". When in fact, I've learned it doesn't mean that at all but rather what you have said, to notice the surroundings. notice what flourishes, and by exclusion what is prone to fail, This strategy improves the chances of having a successful, beautiful garden w/o spending oodles of money and suffering heartbreak from plants that die on you b/c you chose poorly.

Gardenias are a PITA, imo- I wouldn't start wtih them. If you do want to try, you'll need to extensively amend the soil you plant them in, most likely. In my experience, Plumbago hates being too wet, and likes a lot of sun to do well, so I'd not put it in a shady area. Turk's cap may do ok, but may not bloom too much due to lack of direct sun- and as others have said, see what neighbors with similar facing homes have, and what does well. I keep a little list on my computer of what I've seen, what type of year, and which direction and how much sun it gets (part/full). It's a great list when I have a dead spot to fill, and don't want to try something new, but go for somehting that has a really good chance of simply doing well.

Also, if you have a local (non-chain) garden center, they may have someone who would be happy to suggest plants for your home. Bring a map of the house footprint, directions, and collaborate to form ideas of what might do well where!

I definitely need to scout around my neighborhood and see what other people have. I'm just so clueless about plant names, and identifying them seems like such a challenge! I need to work up the courage to knock on random people's doors, perhaps. ;)

Here's the current view of the house - bland and boring, needless to say.

I'd like to build a curving bed in the front, and it would extend at some points into the dappled light, but most of it almost never sees sun.

Close up of the shrubs under the window (it's possible they would normally have more leaves at the base - we took out the boxwoods that were smothering their lower branches earlier this year.) I was guessing this was a privet.

Also, to the left of the house in the corner is a bush growing, and I don't know if it's a weed or not. Any ideas?

Are camellias difficult to grow? I'm nervous about hydrangeas, and if gardenias are tricky I'd rather wait on those too. I really would like a couple of shrub options 4-8 feet high.

second pic looks like ligustrum, a commonly grown shrub. 3rd pic looks like chile pequin, not a weed, but it seems to grow easily anywhere, wanted or unwanted. It is unfair to call it a weed, but many gardeners resent that it makes itself welcome anywhere it wants.

camellias and azaleas are good in Houston but you need to observe in your area if you see pretty ones growing. stop by a neighbor who has a pretty garden and ask them what does well for them. Most gardeners are very proud of their plantings and will be happy to share info and maybe even plants to anybody that asks. Also, need to determine what kind of soil you have as both camellias and azaleas have specific needs. Knowing what kind of soil you have is the very first thing a novice gardener should know b4 they conceive a planting scheme.

Azaleas and camellias grow well in the understory of the pines. They need an acidic soil and good drainage. We grow them to the north (with pine trees), but I'm not sure if the south has acidic soil.

The shrub that was behind the boxwoods appears to be either a Ligustrums (will grow to 12 feet, has clusters of very fragrant tiny white flowers that the bees love) or possibly a banana shrub. We had what we thought were ligustrums but when they bloomed we realized they were something different Someone told us they were a banana bush, and sure enough, the blooms smell like bananas. I just read that they are in the magnolia family. They will also get 10-12 feet tall if not kept pruned.